In The Spotlight

Candidates' Money Was Up, But Party Spending Was Way Up, And Crucial

Flurry of Last-Minute Independent Spending by the Parties Caps an
Election With Record Fundraising by the Senate and House Candidates

The political parties' direct support* for House and Senate candidates topped $230
million in 2006, an increase of nearly two-thirds since 2004 (see
Figure 1). The combined party figures also slightly exceeded the estimated
figures for 2002, the last year the parties could raise soft money before the Bipartisan
Campaign Reform Act.

"There has been a sea change over the past decade in the way congressional
election campaigns are conducted," said Michael J. Malbin, Executive Director
of The Campaign Finance Institute. Noting that in 1994, the parties were responsible
for a small fraction of the support for House and Senate candidates as in 2006, Malbin
said that "Politics has shifted from being a one-on-one game, with the candidates
all for themselves, to a team game. The parties have become crucial. You can see
this in almost all of the close races in both chambers in 2006 ? but especially
in the last minute spending that determined majority control in the Senate."

House and Senate party numbers do not tell precisely the same story.

House party committees far exceeded not only their 2004 totals but also their total
from 2002.

Senate committees were up 60 percent from 2004 but have not fully made for the 2002
soft money they lost.

Senate party committee spending was particularly important in a few key races. The
two parties topped $20 million in Missouri, $10 million in Virginia and $9 million
in New Jersey. In Virginia, more than $3 million of the Democrats' party spending
and $2 million of the Republicans' party spending occurred on or after October 29th.
(Figure 2 shows
the two parties' weekly independent spending in eight Senate races.)

The candidates also raised record amounts in 2006. It took more than $1.1 million
to win a House seat in 2006 (see
Table 1 and Figure
3). Successful House challengers had raised $1.5 million by mid-October+,
compared to the $2.2 million raised by defeated incumbents. This continues a normal
pattern: in most years successful challengers do not raise or spend as much as the
incumbents they beat.

Party spending in these House races averaged nearly $1 million for successful
challengers (or two-thirds of the amount these challengers raised for themselves)
and $1.4 million for the defeated incumbents (see
Table 2. Also see
Table 3 for candidate receipts and party spending in each of the 117
relatively competitive House races -- all those in which the incumbent was defeated
or in which the winning candidate received 60 percent of the vote or less.)

Party spending was also a major factor in the close Senate races. Senate candidates
raised one-third more than their counterparts did when the same seats were up for
election six years ago. But the candidate fundraising was buttressed impressively
by the parties.

Democratic Party spending to support successful Senate challengers averaged $5.2
million per candidate. This was more than 60 percent of the $8.2 million
these challengers raised for themselves.

Republican spending to support their six defeated incumbents averaged $3.7 million,
which was more than 30 percent of the $11.4 million raised by the defeated incumbents
themselves.

Another way to look at this would be to see what the combined candidates' and party
money meant for the balance between the incumbent and challenger.

Taking the Senate candidates' money alone, defeated incumbents had more than a 40
percent financial advantage over their successful challengers.

When the resources were combined, the advantage dropped markedly: $13.3 million
was spent by the candidate and party combined in support of the average

winning challenger, compared to $15.5 million in support of the average defeated
incumbent (see Table 4.
Also see Table 5
for candidate receipts and party spending in all 33 Senate races up for election
in 2006.)

* Direct support by the parties is defined here to include contributions, coordinated
spending and independent spending. For 2002, when most party support came in the
form of soft money supported advertising channeled through state parties, we also
included all hard and soft money transfers from the four congressional campaign
committees to state parties.

+The latest candidate figures available now are from the mid-October
pre-general election reports. In 2004, the amount the candidates had raised by mid-October
equaled 99 percent of the amount they spent for the full cycle.

The Campaign Finance Institute is a non-partisan, non-profit institute affiliated
with the George Washington University that conducts objective research and education,
empanels task forces and makes recommendations for policy change in the field of
campaign finance. Statements of the Campaign Finance Institute and its Task Forces
do not necessarily reflect the views of CFI's Trustees or financial supporters.